The sole purpose of a talent strategy is to support the MNC in achieving its global strategic objectives. Therefore, it needs to be derived from the corporate business plan and must be measured in terms of its contribution to the achievement of company goals. Several approaches to ensure business-talent strategic alignment are proposed:

Link the talent strategy via delivering capability requirements: For a talent strategy to be relevant, it must be anchored I the capability requirements for delivering on the business strategy – currently and into the future. In addition, to be effective, the talent strategy must align to the culture and maturity of the business.

Link talent strategy via talent pools: A useful way of linking the talent strategy to the business strategy is to identify a global talent pool comprising those jobs that are crucial to the MNC. All incumbents occupying those jobs are included in the global talent pool, as are any other employees with rare and/or critical skills. In this way, the talent team focuses on the health of the global talent pool and ensures that the business has the requisite talent to achieve its objectives.

Make talent management part of a total management system: Talent management can be enhanced by having a total management system that focuses on strengthening both the people and the work systems (technical, commercial and operating) to reflect an aligned and consistent working model.

Develop a convincing talent management business case: If the talent strategy is directly linked to the company strategy, then the talent management business case will be uncontroversial and widely accepted within the business. This is important for implementation. Ideally, HR should ‘own’ that part of the business strategy that deals with the role of talent in driving business performance.

Clarify talent management roles: Line managers are accountable for talent management. No matter how robust the talent processes are, there is no substitute for managers’ relationships with, and understanding of, their people when making critical global talent decisions. Line buy-in to talent management is crucial for providing the necessary time, energy and resources to meet talent management demands. Line managers need to understand that they drive talent management – a responsibility they need to embrace enthusiastically. HR’s role is to develop the talent management processes and tools and to facilitate learning and governance of the process. Employees need to take ownership of their own career development and take the necessary steps, with the support of Line and HR, to realise their potential while delivering on performance.

Focus on the company and the person: When designing talent strategies, some MNCs focus solely on the company, while others emphasise the individual. An optimal talent strategy places equal weight on meeting the needs on both company and individual.

Adopt a ‘tight-loose’ global talent strategy: For global issues, practices and information need to be standardised so that accurate comparisons can be made across the MNC. Where standardised practices are adopted, the MNC should develop a universal ‘talent way of working’ to inform the group and to develop the competencies and wherewithal to implement such practices uniformly. All other talent-related matters should be decentralised and flexible, allowing each country to optimise its talent approach in line with its specific circumstances.

Become a genuine employer of choice: There is no single ‘silver bullet’ for success in talent management. Instead, if an MNC wants to be competitive in attracting, retaining and deploying high-calibre talent, it needs to create the right environment and adopt an aspirational total employment offering and employment value proposition that will be attractive to its target talent market. This is as applicable to a small local business as it is to a global MNC.

While much has been written on talent management in the global context, talent management in emerging markets and the unique challenges and opportunities it presents has received little attention in the literature. This book explores these issues through theory, practice and case studies with contributions from scholars and practitioners based both in emerging markets and in Canada, the United Kingdom and The United States.

The book provides the reader with a guide to setting up a talent management function in a multinational operating in emerging markets, including some 70 learnings and a set of key performance indicators with indicative targets to achieve when managing talent effectively in emerging markets.

Throughout the book, talent management examples are drawn from diverse emerging markets across Asia (especially India and China), Africa, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and South America. These diverse examples underline the fact that, while we speak of ‘emerging markets’ as a single term, managing talent in each emerging country has unique features that need to be approached in a specific (rather than generic, one-size-fits-all) manner.

About the editor: Steve obtained his PhD in Industrial Psychology from the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits). He became a Professor of Human Resources at the Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) at the University of Pretoria in 2011. He also runs a consultancy, which has worked with several multinational corporations on global talent management.